


where the lines fade out

by dwyndling



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, M/M, Time Loop, angst...several ppl have a Not Fun Time, cavalier descriptions of violence, sora u dumb lil chicken nugget, terranort needs to take a chill pill, terraqua if u squint!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:43:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21985324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dwyndling/pseuds/dwyndling
Summary: Darkness prevails, and Light expires. Then, Sora blinks, and Darkness prevails and Light expires.(AKA the time loop fic where Sora follows his heart...to an absolute myriad of results.)
Relationships: Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 123





	where the lines fade out

It begins in the moment that Ven runs towards the man wearing Terra’s face.

(Actually, it began more than a decade ago, but we will come to that in due time.)

The events directly thereafter are somewhat of a blur. Donald’s spell barely registers in his ears, but the grief in the following moments burns with a fresh and jagged hurt. There are screams, and faint whispers of pain that are lost to the wind in the instant after they are born. 

“Sora. You don’t believe that.”

Sora’s ears are ringing. Riku’s footsteps get farther and farther away, until they are consumed by the noise of the rising wind. The surrounding world loses more and more of it’s color with every passing moment.

The world erupts into a blaze of violet light and deep, insatiable darkness, something polarized that makes no sense to the human eye. 

There is one more single shout that echoes out before it is over, and then all Sora has left is his own harried breathing. 

...what follows next is a despair unlike that of any which he has known before. 

The void stretches out before him, a multitude of spectral chains hanging limp and cold. Static buzzes in the back of his eyelids.

Darkness consumes. 

The world around him is nothing but shadows, drowning him in their nothingness, draining his consciousness. Sora struggles to blink, before all fades to emptiness.

[Continue]

_ Blink. _

Ven is running towards the man with Terra’s face. 

Sora takes an unconscious step after him, already preempted by Aqua inserting herself between the two. 

The confrontation...is beginning again.

His mind is abuzz, thoughts filtering through in scattered fragments.

_ W...what? _

He watches in listless confusion as Ven is sent flying back towards the rockface. The-Terra-Who-Is-Not-Terra bats Lea away with the same ruthless strength, and turns towards Kairi next. 

Suddenly, the sensation of heedlessly running towards her comes flooding back with a vengeance, but unfortunately for Kairi, Sora’s feet remain firmly planted on the ground this time, rooted with shock. 

The man with Terra’s face raises the keyblade with a twisted grin. 

_ Kairi- _

Sora feels something in his chest snap, in disjointed time with the noise Kairi’s back makes when she collides with the ground some forty feet away from where she was in the moment before. 

_ W-what...what’s going on?  _

_ Huh…? _

_ No...no...Kairi…!! _

Nothing is making sense. This isn’t real. 

The next sensation that registers is Riku shaking him by the shoulders, and yelling his name. Sora shakes his head trying to clear it, staring up at his friend in a daze. 

This is just a bad dream. Right? It has to be. He’s hallucinating. 

They just did this. 

Riku stops shaking him when Sora’s chin rises, but his hands are still unnervingly tight around Sora’s shoulders. “Sora, talk to me! Say something!” 

He must make some sort of noise, because the hard expression on Riku’s face fades away into something else. It’s then and there that he takes in his friend’s posture, tense and coiled like a spring. Slowly, the surrounding sounds begins to make sense in Sora’s ears again.

“Sora, talk to me!”

As if from very far away, Sora hears himself speak. 

“Riku...what’s going on?” 

Riku is squeezing his shoulders with a vengeance that Riku himself doesn’t seem quite cognizant of. The expression on his face is painted with badly veiled panic.

Not that far away, the casting of Zettaflare can be heard. 

_ He’s done it, Donald, that was amazing! That was so cool, I had no idea you knew that kinda magic!! Can you teach me to do that?? _

_...Donald? _

“You’re spacing out. You’ve got to keep it together right now!”

Sora shakes his head in bewilderment. “It won’t matter.” It hardly even feels like it’s him that’s speaking. His voice is empty and quiet between his ears and yet still far too loud. 

_ We just did this. _

Riku’s eyebrows have knit themselves together in a knot. “...Sora? What...are you...okay?” His friend’s increasingly frazzled patience is beginning to show in his tone. 

Numbly, Sora shakes his head again. “We just did this...I…” He trails off helplessly.

_ Kairi...? _

He can’t feel his hands. 

With a wince, Riku clinically looks him over, eyes flashing in panic. “You’re not making sense. Did you hit your head back there?”

Maybe he  _ did _ , but somehow even Sora knows that’s not the answer he’s looking for. “Riku, I-”

The ground shudders beneath them, and Sora finds his gaze drawn to where Mickey and Goofy are hunched over the prone duck. Kairi is sprawled off to the right, alone, but not far from where Lea’s body lies against the rock he last bounced off of. Aqua is kneeled low next to Ven, with a look on her face like a wounded predator.

A shadow is casting itself over the area, and beyond where the bodies lay the darkness is growing, swirling into an unholy tempest. 

Sora’s heart beats fiercely.

_ This isn’t a dream. I have to fight. I have to… _

Riku still has a concerned hand resting on his shoulder, but it drops away at Sora’s seemingly returned awareness. “We can’t give up here.” His voice drops lower, from sternness, to something unbearably gentle. “Are you ready, Sora?”

From not that far off, Mickey raises his head hurriedly. “Riku, no! We have to get to safety while there’s still time!”

Shaking his head, a fey light gleams in Riku’s eyes. “It’s a little too late for that.”

Picking herself up from where she’s kneeled next to Ven, Aqua strides forward. “He’s right. Mickey, Goofy, watch over the others.” Her expression is drawn tightly, blue eyes dark with intention. Sora finds himself cowed by her face in that moment, in the way the line of her shoulders carries death within it. 

Riku starts walking forwards too, towards the frantic swarm of darkness swirling in the sky above. He meets Aqua halfway, and they stand with keyblades drawn, pointed at the unholy tempest. 

Finding his feet in a blur of a moment, Sora skitters after them, the Kingdom Key firm within his grip. It still feels like a dream, but he tries to focus his scattered thoughts on the enemy in front of them, Riku a comforting blur on the left side of his periphery. 

_ Yeah...even if this is a nightmare, there’s no way I could lose with Riku beside me.  _

_ At least...no. We can’t lose like this.  _

The swarm’s frantic dance reaches a new peak in intensity and bears down upon them like an avenging force of nature itself. The very air thrums with the strength of it’s intent.

Aqua is the first to concede, and the sturdy keyblade in her hand falls limply down to her side. She stares up at the impending wave of darkness, but if she says anything, it’s too faint for Sora to hear, the crescendo of the teeming Shadows reaching new heights. 

She’s swept away by the tide in the next instant. 

Riku calls after her frantically, and Sora finds the Kingdom Key wisping away into streams of light, hanging his head and desperately trying to calm his stuttering heartbeat. 

_ We just did this. I know we did. I remember the exact intonation of how Riku screamed for Master Aqua.  _

Suddenly Riku’s hand is on his shoulder again. “Sora-”

He can’t quite bring himself to look up at his friend. “I’m...I’m…”

It’s useless. He wants to say something. But what can he say? Would Riku even believe him? 

“Sora...don’t cry.” Riku’s voice is a very gentle reprimand. 

“...huh?” He forces his eyes up, and realizes with a start that tears of panic are streaming down his face. 

_ We just did this.  _

_ But...why...why am I… _

Riku is looking down at him, expression grim and pinched around the edges. “You can’t cry. We’re not dead yet. We can still fight!”

_ We’re not dead yet.  _

Sora desperately scrabbles for words. “Riku…” He gestures helplessly at the tide, swarming around them, with all the force of a deafening shriek increasing in intensity. “We can’t. We can’t beat that thing.” The tears are coming harder now.

He feels himself stumble, as if to fall to his knees. 

_ What...what’s going on...I have to think....I have to...I have to… _

_ We’re going to die again.  _

Riku hauls him right back up, and sets him on his feet. He visibly hesitates, but the increasing pitch of the swarm seems to make him force the words out. 

“You’re the strongest person I know, Sora.” The look on his face freezes Sora in his tracks, too frozen to even cry harder. “You’ll find a way.” 

And with that, Riku’s hands falls away from Sora’s shoulder and he turns away, treading steadily towards where the swarm is buzzing closer and closer towards them. 

Sora reaches for him with both hands, taking an unsteady step in the same direction, but Riku’s already brandished Braveheart, and with that same shout, echoing brokenly though Sora’s head, plunges it into the deluge of darkness aiming itself directly at them. 

_ I...what do I do...what do IwhatdoIwhatdoIwhdoIwaoIwhd _

His knees hit the ground again. The streams of heartless skim just past him, just far enough that they don’t graze him, and the reek of them is enough to make him recoil. 

_ Riku...Riku...no...nononononononononono- _

The darkness is starting to seep off, or straight through, the blurry figure of his friend up ahead. Sora scrambles to his feet and takes one dash, another and reaches, reaches as hard as he can, pleading for-

Darkness envelopes him. 

[Continue]

_ Wha...what… _

Ven is running towards the man wearing Terra’s face. 

Sora staggers slightly.

_ We just- _

Seconds pass as he attempts to find his bearings. Too many. People are moving around him, but his vision blurs and the specifics are lost to him.

Lea flies backwards towards the rock face. Kairi staggers, under the weight of the keyblade that bears down on her body, and then falls forward. 

The man wearing Terra’s face raises his triumphant gaze, and locks eyes directly with Sora. Time slows into a parody of its former self, something slower than the drip of honey.

Before he can worry more, before he can think at all, Sora’s sprinting for her. The body, that beloved frame, that now creates a splash of bright pink on the ground in this decrepit wasteland.

She’s not…

She can’t be-

The man with Terra’s face stands before him, smirking. His keyblade is extended up, poised to strike down on Sora with the same vengeance. 

Not a single thought echoes around his head. He can only stand, protectively in front of Kairi’s already prone form, and tremble. There is no thought of summoning his own weapon, not when he’s so tenuously suspended between shock and panic. 

Those yellow eyes bore into him, and spell out a fate that denies unwriting. The silver and black keyblade slices the air, a direct path for him and-

In a rush of air, another silver keyblade is there to meet it, and Riku snarls up at the man towering over him, braced protectively in front of them like a knight out of a fairytale.

Sora’s breath catches in his throat, and, even as he goes to call Riku’s name, Xehanort’s ally moves again, and the keyblade comes down again, and again, and again. Riku’s guard refuses to break, even as he grits his teeth and glares fiercely up at the man.

Time hangs in the balance. Those five seconds seem to cross an eternity.

All he himself can do is sink to his knees, in the dust next to Kairi. Leaning down to her face, her breath comes faint and shallow, and Sora nearly breaks into tears of relief right then and there.

Suddenly, Riku is not alone, and Master Aqua is there, bringing her elderly keyblade down at their enemy’s back, and the Terra-who-is-not-Terra is turning and-

The silver and black keyblade lances through the air, striking Riku across the back of the neck even as the Organization member turns away. Riku makes a soft and abruptly cut off sound, and falls-

Straight down and across Sora, laying limp and unresponsive in his arms.

He can’t move. His breath that was caught in his throat refuses to come any further. 

_ This can’t be happening. _

The sounds of a struggle continue behind him, but Sora has no eyes for that. With trembling hands, he fumbles for Riku’s pulse. It should be here, shouldn’t it? Maybe on his wrist-

The body sags, off his lap, and rolls loosely onto the dusty ground. Sora grabs for him, trying to steady him by the shoulders. 

There...there’s a small trickle of blood dribbling down from the corner of Riku’s mouth. The pulse is there, but it’s faint, and erratic.

_ This isn’t happening. _

His breath, which had formerly refused to function at all, now comes all at once with the hurtling force of a crashing wave. Sora hears his breath coming in staggered gasps, as if from the next room over. 

All he can do is kneel there, in silence, between the two fallen bodies. 

_ Is this...? _

_ The end...it’s arriving. _

The thought doesn’t even feel like his own, much less a cognizant thing he can grapple with. 

_ A dream? A nightmare…no. I know what it feels like inside a dream, and this  _ definitely _ isn’t it. A...a time loop? I get the theory of it, but… _

_ I...am I crying? My face feels wet...why does everything feel so floaty? _

The noises in the background have begun to fade away. The world ceases to be, and the only plane of existence is the single quivering moment in which he stares down and Riku’s unconscious face.

“Sora.”

His head twitches up instinctively at the soft sound of Master Aqua’s voice. Her expression is stony, but the grief is evident in her eyes. “Can you stand?”

The numb feeling flooding his senses is enough to keep him from responding, but he allows the older keyblade wielder to slowly pull him to his feet. 

Riku and Kairi lay still, in the dust. 

If...if he looks down at them...he won’t be able to go on. He keeps his chin up and pointed forward by sheer instinct alone.

_ I can’t…can’t give up yet...right…? _

It’s definitely tears that are making their way down his face to make dark spots on the ground below. A harsh, high pitched noise escapes him, and it’s as though he’s forgotten how to move his limbs.

Aqua tugs him forward, towards the swarming and shrieking tide. Sora almost tugs back against her grip, wants to pick up the bodies of his friends and  _ run _ -

But there is no escape. They cannot possibly run faster than the demonic swarm.

Master Aqua brandishes her keyblade, and the Kingdom Key comes to his hand in the same moment, perhaps understanding duty when he himself can barely stay vertical.

Sora feels his lips part slightly, staring up at the tide of Heartless as tears continue to streak their way down his face. It’s as if a tornado of ink has directed itself towards them, with all the pitch and terror of a shriek. 

_ Riku...Kairi… _

_ I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what’s going on.  _

_ I...I don’t know how to save everyone. _

_ You’re what gives me strength. But if you’re gone, how can...how can I… _

The darkness closes down on them. 

Aqua thrusts her keyblade forth, into the inky mire, and for an instant, a gleam of light so bright it could blind gleams out, pushing back against the wave. 

It is a moment so radiant he can barely describe it. Aqua stands, teeth bared and shoulders squared against the unholy amalgamation of Shadows. Power ripples out from her keyblade and her body, as if a great bell has just been tolled, and the resulting shockwaves were made of glittering dust.

It illuminates the battlefield, washing everything with a silver glow. And then, in the next moment, it flickers out. 

A wordless scream rips it’s way out of Sora’s chest, and he lunges for Aqua, still faintly silhouetted against the darkness. She’s floating a foot off the ground, lingering in mid air from whatever power she’d expended, but then-

It all fades in an instant, as the darkness washes over them. Aqua’s figure up ahead flickers to black the second after, and Sora is left alone again, in the growing darkness. 

In a panic, he tries to turn, run back, back to where Riku and Kairi had been left prone on the ground. But, there is no escape. The darkness is much faster than his small human form can manage. 

It all washes over him, with the force of a wave, and the terror of the deepest nightmare. 

[Continue]

He’s running before he knows what he’s doing, quite literally. Sora is running before Ven can even  _ think _ of moving, before the boy can even conceptualize of dashing heedlessly towards the man with deceptively blue eyes. 

_ They’re there. We were all standing in a row, just the same as last time. They’re there, they’re real, they’re breathing, they’re  _ alive. 

The Kingdom Key flies to his hands without a trace of hesitation, and Sora leaps. His arms swing back above his own head, readying a decisive strike, holding his keyblade with slightly shaking hands.

_ Not again. You’ll never hurt Riku or Kairi again, not while I’m around. _

Several things happen at once. Riku yells out, something that Sora doesn’t quite hear. That grim silver keyblade coalesces in the man’s hands, and it’s being pushed forward, not in a defensive block, but instead-

Sora doesn’t really understand what happens next in that moment. Everything is a flashing blur of white, and bright colors ricocheting around in the back of his own eyelids and...

_ Pain.  _ Pain like he’s never known before. The ache of his heart separating from his body might as well have been a light pinch compared to this. 

He can hear Riku’s voice...but why does Riku sound so echoey? Did something happen to his ears…?

His blurred perspective shifts very suddenly, and if he wasn’t on the ground before, he probably is now. Someone is laughing, deep and throaty and insane, but Sora can’t really bring himself to care. Why bother focusing on the things around him when he himself already hurts so much and-

_ Exhale. _

It doesn’t hurt anymore. 

Sora tilts his head to the side, and stares down at his own body, crumpled in the dirt. A wound like an incision sits in the center of his chest, an equally vicious exit wound painted on his back. 

The sand below his body is quickly being stained red. 

Something twinges inside of him, and suddenly, Riku and Kairi are both there, leaning over the body and yelling, and casting Cure spells like it’s their lives that are on the line here and not-

_ I’m... _

Everything feels fuzzier with every passing moment. Sora can only stare hollowly at the shadowy figures around him, and marvel at how disconnected he feels. 

_ Did I...did I die…? _

_ I...I think I died.  _

_ I was...speared on a keyblade? _

None of it feels real in the slightest.

The world around him becomes more fuzzy with each passing moment. The lights and darks of his surroundings melt into each other, and now it would seem he is somewhere else entirely. 

Somewhere where nothing...nothing matters anymore…

Sleep. It’s all over now. 

[Continue]

The world snaps back into place with the rigidity of a stone.

Sora’s keyblade flies into his hand on pure instinct, but his feet stay rooted in the dirt, as he blankly stares ahead. 

_ I died. I died, and now I’m standing right back where I was. _

_ I...I… _

Ven is moving forward, and Sora watches him in horror, as if these events are playing out before him in slow motion. Aqua is moving after him, but she won’t be fast enough, no, it’s going to happen  _ again _ , no-

Sora runs. He runs faster than Ventus, because he  _ has to _ . There is not an option. 

Riku shouts again from behind him, but it is of no concern. He won’t be stupid this time and leave his chest exposed. If somehow, someway, he’s been gifted yet another chance at this, he cannot squander it. 

After all, who can say how many retries are left?

He leaps forward, and the Terra-who-is-not-Terra seems to understand in that instant that he can no longer play at deception...just as before. The silver and black keyblade appears again. It is pointed at his chest. 

_ No. The same trick can’t possibly work twice. I  _ know  _ what he’s going to do.  _

_ You won’t hurt the people I love.  _

_ I  _ refuse.

Teeth gritted together so tight his jaw aches, Sora plunges the Kingdom Key at his opponent. If the man wants to play the offensive, two can play at that game.

But only one can win.

Something sparks at the tip of the silver and black keyblade. A blazing light, sparking out into a beam of mottled energy. It cleaves the air towards him, and before Sora can even  _ ponder _ the possibility of dodging out of the way or attempting to block it-

The cool rush of a Reflega is there around him, and Riku stands at his side, glaring up at their adversary. 

A smile breaks it’s way onto Sora’s face in spite of himself. 

_ When we stand together like this, nothing can stand against us. I know Riku feels it too.  _

Several things happen at once. When the spell connects with the Reflega, it breaks off into ribbons of darkness that ricochet off the walls of the canyon, fizzling out soon after. The reaction sparks a wall of smoke, flooding the ground, until Sora can barely see Riku’s figure stood next to him.

The air is heavy with tension, and Sora distantly wonders if his heavy panting is quite as loud as it sounds in his own ears. 

_ Maybe...maybe the Shadow swarm won’t even kill us this time. Maybe...maybe there is still a way to fight it. _

The moments tick out with excruciating pause. It feels as though time has slowed to a halt in Sora’s ears, and he can only hear his own breathing in slow motion.

_ There has to be a way to fight back. Maybe...that’s why I was given this chance?  _

_ Maybe...I can still save us all? _

_ But...everytime...the Heartless sweep us all away just the same. We all...fade to darkness.  _

_...wait. _

_ That’s not what happened last time.  _

_ I died...and then I was right back here again. So… _

_ It’s  _ not  _ the darkness? It’s...it’s me dying? Or something like that...I bet Riku or Master Aqua would be able to figure it out.  _

_ But instead...it’s up to me.  _

The smoke has begun to fade. Riku still stands tensed at his side, peering this way and that. Elsewhere, the sounds of a tense scuffle have begun. His eyes linger on Riku’s profile unconsciously, on the dignified line of his nose and the blue steel in his eyes.

_ Then...then... _

He can barely hear it over the pattering of his own heart in his ears. They can still fix this. They can still  _ win _ .

“Ri-”

Almost in perfect melodic time with Sora opening his mouth to speak, Riku drops to the ground with barely a sound.

The Terra-who-is-not-Terra stands over him with a wide smirk, as the keyblade master plants on his face in the dirt. There is a neat scarlet incision at the back of his neck, and it’s hard to tell what would’ve taken him down first, the blow to the head, or the resulting chop to the spine.

Sora sees nothing but red.

A scream bellows out. It’s probably from him, but he’s moving too fast to tell. The Kingdom Key lances through the air, battering against the man’s keyblade, over and over. The metal clangs against metal with a vengeance, a harsh and broken noise against the quiet confusion of the place.

There are no thoughts in his mind, only a furious, furious empty light.

It’s hard to say if the man dodges away, or if someone pulls him off, but suddenly the fight has spread, and Donald and Mickey are there, and Sora has fallen to his knees and-

Zettaflare echoes out around the canyon. A radiant blast, carrying with it the finality of desperation. The small magician, utterly spent, collapses to the ground.

Sora does not hear it.

Riku’s face is devoid of color, and his eyes are shut. He’s not breathing, at least not visibly, as Sora’s hands scrabble over his neck and wrist for a pulse, heedlessly tearing off one of Riku’s gloves. 

_ It has to be there. It has to.  _

He can’t find it.

Mickey and Master Aqua’s voices are arguing in the background. He can sense rather than hear Ven standing a few feet behind him, waffling back and forth in anxiety.

Kairi staggers up to them, and kneels down beside him. Her lips are pressed into a hard line, and her face is white like a sheet. “Sora!? Is he…”

Sora barely notices her approach. His hands stay clamped like a vice around Riku’s bare wrist, waiting. 

Suspension, hanging limply within disbelief.

More voice surround them, and it is useless to attempt to decipher who’s is who’s. Nothing but stray bits and pieces filter through.

“.......head trauma….instantly?”

“.....expected…..would there be….unfortunately….magic…”

Nothing is making sense in his ears. Kairi’s hands are on his arm, gently tugging him away. Unconsciously resisting, he stoically stays put where he is, staring down at Riku’s slack face. 

_ This isn’t happening.  _

_ It’s not. _

_ I’m stuck in a nightmare. That’s why it keeps repeating itself.  _

_ Wake up...yes...I need to wake up… _

There are more hands, shaking his shoulders, trying to catch his attention, but Sora pays them no mind. It’s as though he’s forgotten who, what, and where he is, so deep is the intensity of this sensation.

The darkness comes for them all, even as Aqua and Kairi combine their magic into a barrier that only holds for a few precious seconds. 

Sora does not watch the barrier break into a million sparkling fragments. He does not see the darkness swirl up to swallow them. His face is buried in Riku’s unmoving chest.

[Continue]

Tears, crystalline and jagged, break their way out of him. Sora’s chest shudders, and he gasps brokenly for breath.

Ven is running towards the man with Terra’s face. There is no time.

With a muffled sob, Sora turns and throws himself at Riku, wrapping his arms as tight as he can around the taller boy’s waist.

_ His chest moves as he’s breathing. I can hear his heartbeat. I can hear his heartbeat. _

“Sora…?” Riku’s voice comes through faint with surprise, and he can just imagine the abject confusion that must be on his friend’s face right now.

It is too much, to put this feeling into words. Far beyond his ability, as raw and shattered as his chest currently feels. Everything in his ribcage has splintered into shards of glass, and all he can do is pray the rest of him doesn’t shatter along with it.

The man with Terra’s face has just sent Ven flying like a humanoid baseball. There is no time to think.

Riku’s hands are reaching up for him in confusion, but Sora breaks away, spinning to face where Not-Terra is quickly turning towards Kairi. 

He starts sprinting half a second before Lea does, and they leap at the man as one. Two keyblades arch through the air, sweeping up towards their foe.

The man with Terra’s face deals a swift blow to the side of Lea’s head with one motion, and darts towards Sora next, speed belying his stature. No time to dodge, no time to think.

Kairi screams something from behind him. Perhaps his name, or some amalgamation of warning.

Something sharp glances his neck, or maybe his chest, it goes by too fast to tell, and suddenly the floating feeling is back. Colors stop making sense, and light trickles into runny streaks. 

But the pain...the pain remains.

Some sort of pressure is on his chest to such an extent that he can barely breathe. Sora heaves a breath, only to discover he can’t. His eyes are wide open, unable to blink, his whole body left askew and fallen to the ground.

The smirking man moves out of his line of sight. Kairi yells again, this time with fury. 

_ Kairi…!! _

He can’t...he can’t move at all. Not even to flick his gaze to the side, as if even the muscles of his eyes have completely locked up. Some scuffle is happening behind him. 

He hears Kairi make a cut off sound, before a dull thump occurs. Other voices are crying out, but the ringing in his ears makes them impossible to discern.

_ This...some kind of Stop spell?? I can barely think straight...I’m… _

_ I failed again.  _

These same emotions rise up with a swell of helplessness, and if he could physically sob, he would. The sky lies mockingly dusty above him, teeming with swirling Heartless. They circle onwards, a corrupted and menacing airborne waltz.

To his side, there is a flurry of motion. Sora cannot twist his neck to see what it is, but Zettaflare rings out with the same desperation as ever. 

He can’t cry. He physically cannot. Perhaps his heart is even caught mid-beat.

But...he’s not dead. Which means...that the pain won’t stop. 

Suddenly, there are hands on him, and his body is being shifted. Every movement sends more spires of pain lancing through his chest, but Sora has no means with which to tell them to desist.

Riku is leaning over him, face cast into shadow against the light. “...ra...Sora..?!”

With a start, it sinks in that Riku has been calling his name for several moments now. Try as he might, he can’t force his head to move, or his mouth to make sound.

_ Riku!! Riku’s here… _

_ I’m...if this is how I go, at least he’s here. And...hopefully not injured.  _

Riku’s hands are at his neck, fumbling for a pulse.

_ I just did this with you...I’m almost getting used to it by now. _

As expected on Sora’s part, they don’t find one.

He’s in the perfect spot to watch Riku’s face go pale, aquamarine eyes wide and disbelieving. His friend’s lips part, as if fumbling for words. 

Around them, the tide is snatching up the Guardians of Light one by one. Soon, they will be the only ones left.

“Sora.” Riku’s harried voice comes from between clenched teeth. “Say something.” His voice is tiny, almost silent against the wind picking up in the canyon. 

Sora, of course, says nothing, and only stares vacantly up at where Riku’s face is drawn and bloodless.

_ I...Riku… _

_ I’ve let you down. I’ve let you all down, haven’t I. _

_ I’ll try again. I will. As many times as it takes. Now that I think I know what’s going on… _

_ Nothing can keep me from saving you. Nothing can stand in my way. _

Even when so obviously and thoroughly distraught, Riku’s face is still elegant, even as his eyes are glassing over with tears. “ _ Sora.”  _

The sound is broken, and miniscule against the wind. The tempest behind them is whipping itself into a frenzy.

The edge of Sora’s vision begins to blur. Not being able to fully draw breath is starting to take its toll.

Riku inhales jaggedly, and it’s clear the boy is shoving down sobs. “You-” His voice catches roughly, and he pauses for a moment, shoulders shuddering. 

Even here, barely gracing the edges of reality, it’s comfortable in Riku’s arms, completely regardless of the level of actual physical comfort. It’s...nice, even among the pain that encages his whole body, to have this moment, after all the fighting. 

How long has it been? How does time even function for him anymore? Is there an answer?

But here...in the arms of his best friend, it doesn’t seem to matter so much. It’s a bit difficult to see, when his eyes refuse to move, but Riku is directly in his line of vision, impossible to miss. Leaning over him, supporting his shoulders with his arms. 

In some ways, it’s quite difficult to describe the feeling that it brings. 

“You...were the most precious person to me.”

_ Riku...you’re my best friend too. You always have been. You’ve never not been one of the most special people in the world to me, for as long as I can remember. _

Riku makes a somewhat painful noise as he chokes on another sob. “...I could never be like you. But it was enough…” He takes a ragged breath, “to be your friend.”

“Even if…” And this part is so hushed that Sora doubts he quite heard it correctly. “I never told you the rest.” A hoarse sob. “I hope you can forgive me for that.”

_...huh? _

The Shadow Swarm shrieks from nearby.

Riku’s eyes widen, and his arms tighten around Sora’s shoulders. “Wait for me, Sora.” His voice is strained. “Wherever you are, I’ll find you. I-” 

With a great and terrible rush, all is enveloped by darkness.

[Continue]

There goes Ven, right on schedule.

Questions dart through Sora’s mind, but the first rush of air as his chest expands and he inhales is enough to lay them all to rest. 

_ This time. I’ll protect everyone, and then I’ll ask Riku what he meant. _

“Ven!” He shouts, “Stop!!”

Ventus shuffles to a halt, about halfway to where the man is standing, and turns back to look at Sora with a confused expression. “Huh? It’s just Terra!” He’s already turning away, expression slipping back into joyous relief. “We found him!”

There’s no time to refute the ridiculous, if seemingly apparent, claim. Sora drags his gaze away, and turns towards the enemy, only half-aware of how ridiculous he looks practically growling at someone who’s done nothing but stand there yet. “That’s not Terra!!”

Aqua steps forward in agreement, eyes locked on the figure. “Xehanort has tried this trick before, Ven.” Her icy gaze carries steel in it’s spine, as she hails the figure. “How do we know you’re actually Terra?”

Ven stares round in shock, but Sora doesn’t have time to comfort him, instead calling his keyblade to hand in a flash of light that exudes fury. “We know your game! It won’t work!!”

Riku strides up beside him, and the presence alone is a wave of comfort. He remains wordless, but lowers himself into a battle stance beside Sora’s, expression calm.

He can’t help but turn his gaze to see him. “Riku-”

As if that simple word was the key to summoning him, he’s cut off by their enemy's advance, and Riku abruptly whirls upwards to meet the jagged silver keyblade with Braveheart.

Terra’s face sneers down at the two of them. More and more it becomes clear in Sora’s head that when he meets the yellowed gaze, even set within a different face he is still directly locking eyes with Master Xehanort himself.

From the side, Ventus audibly gasps, and Aqua has her keyblade in hand within the moment.

Riku shoulders through the attack, and shoves Xehanort backwards enough to find his footing again. Sora darts beside him to support, and Ventus hurtles up too, face twisted in hurt. 

Apparently, Xehanort sees this as an opportunity. He lunges, towards where Ventus has halfway called Wayward Wind to his hand, and the wicked looking keyblade makes a whistling sound as it comes down onto him. 

Sora is there in time for a block, and the blow rings out against his own keyblade instead of Ven’s head. Before Ven can even get out a noise of appreciation for that fact, Aqua is there, behind their enemy and aiming the keyblade she carries at his heart. 

Mickey runs up behind them, dropping into a defensive stance besides Riku, and immediately jumping back out and towards their opponent. “Aqua, look out!!”

The mouse king is correct, in that Xehanort is turning to meet the new opponent, and a flare of shadowy magic is issuing from the tip of his keyblade, likely to detonate before Aqua can prepare a reflect. 

It’s move, or let another one of his friends suffer. 

Sora does not think before he begins running, which is normal. On the contrary, he suddenly thinks not too much, in the split second after he starts running, and begins remembering how fast this guy is. Suddenly the silver and black keyblade is pointed at his face again, with the growing ball of magic much closer than it had been moments ago. 

_ Not aga-! _

_ “Zettaflare!!” _

A wide explosion occurs next, for a few different reasons.

On the plus side, Zettaflare has once again worked splendidly at removing their enemy from the equation. On the downside, Sora is pretty positive his legs aren’t going to move no matter what he does, if the numb and vacant sensation where his limbs should be is to be believed. 

So instead, he lays there and stares at the sky. If you ignored all the Heartless currently flooding it in the general vicinity, it might even be a nice day...for the Keyblade Graveyard, at least. 

“Sora!!” 

He tries to turn his head towards where Riku’s panicked tone is coming from, but discovers that too is an impossibility. It must be a pretty bad injury, considering he can barely twitch a muscle, even if it doesn’t feel that painful.

...then again, that might be the shock talking. 

Riku skitters over next to him, and crouches over him carefully. “Are you okay?” His voice is strained, but not quite as desperate as Sora last remembers it. 

_ Heh...this is starting to get way too familiar. _

He tries to smile as best he can, and manages to make the muscles of his throat move enough to croak out an affirmative. “I’m alive.”

Riku exhales abruptly, something that might otherwise be counted as a sigh of relief, and yet somehow wasn’t. “Good. Okay. We can work with alive.”

His friend’s face is smeared with dirt and whatever dark magic exploded just now, and if he could move his arms, Sora finds himself with half a mind to reach up and attempt to wipe it away. “You…?”

With an expression that was probably meant to be a smile, Riku nods. “I’m fine. I’m more concerned as to why you’re still laying there like a starfish.”

“Riku,” and Sora finds he physically can’t raise his voice to anything above a stage-whisper, “I can’t feel the rest of me.” 

This takes a visible two moments of Riku’s expression shifting before it pales dramatically. “That’s...not good.” In a flash of light, Braveheart is in Riku’s hands, and he’s channeling a Curaga. 

The cooling sensation floats over him, but Sora finds he’s only really aware of it where it touches his face. Some of the life does spark back into his nerves, but then again-

-so does the pain. His expression screws up into knots, as spasms of a sharp cutting sensation envelope his limbs and-

Riku quickly casts another Cure spell, praise be upon him, and it must be something stronger, because then the pain fades out into something more dull, and less like being stabbed over and over again in every nerve. 

A scream echoes out from behind them.

With obviously honed reflexes, Riku whirls around, and though Sora can’t see his expression, or what’s happening, he has a pretty good guess. 

It turns out he is, unfortunately, correct, as the tide swooshes around the canyon, picking up the wielders one by one. Aqua doesn’t make a sound, but both Ventus and Kairi cry out, and Goofy’s somewhat belated call for help reaches his ears as well.

With a gasp, Riku leans over him to shield Sora’s body with his own. Such an action didn’t seem to deter the swarm for any of the others, but maybe their spot behind a boulder is giving them an extra few moments of respite. 

Sora can’t complain at this point. He tries to curl his fingers inwards, and only manages a twitch. 

_ He’s warm...this is almost like a hug. _

Riku picks himself up all too soon, looking back towards the behemoth amalgamation. “Sora...can you stand?” There’s something weary and desperate in his voice, which Sora can only empathize with all too well.

Sora attempts to shift his hips, to pull his weight under him...and only twitches uselessly. “Maybe if you pull me up?” In an attempt to diffuse the despair, he cracks a crooked smile at him.

He hopes Riku doesn’t feel he’s acting too flippant about the situation, but at this point, it’s a little hard to feign surprise or terror. The shock of being swallowed up in that rabid darkness has worn off, and tired resignation sits held back only by tenuous threads.

Riku carefully gets his hands supporting his back,  _ this is really like a hug now, shut up Sora, not the time,  _ and pulls him upright. 

It becomes clear to both of them then and there that there’s no way Sora can walk like this. His torso flops limply against Riku, hands trailing in the dirt. 

With a weak grin, Sora attempts to tilt his head back to meet Riku’s eyes better. “...sorry.” 

_ It’s really unfair that we can be in a giant explosion and his hair still looks good. I bet mine’s a disaster right now...though it hardly matters.  _

Riku swallows hard, and Sora can’t help but track the motions of his throat. “Don’t apologize.” He doesn’t seem to know what to say after that, and his friend’s expression turns distant, staring at the ground beside them, but not setting Sora back down. 

He stares at him like that for several moments before it occurs to Sora that he’s simply drinking in the view of Riku’s side profile. 

_...isn’t that...kind of a weird thing to do? Maybe so...or maybe I’m just extra out of it right now. _

The next thought contains more than a little bitterness.  _ I wonder how the next time’s going to go. I wonder what new and exciting ways we’ll all die in next? _

Tears of desperation begin to dribble their way down his face, before he can tell them no.

_ I suppose I should be thankful for this moment of rest. Before it all goes to hell again. _

_ To rest here...in the arms of the most special person...I wish it could just end here, if it has to end. _

Riku turns towards him, and his eyes flash in alarm when he sees the crying. “Sora-!” He reaches up to gently brush away the tears, his whole posture now flooded with concern. 

_ The most special person. The most special, handsome, kind, and thoughtful person I know. _

Aquamarine is staring down into cobalt. 

_ The most special person...I...this isn’t… _

Sora blinks and forces his gaze away, and tries to shove down at the new wave of thoughts that have entered his head. “Heh...sorry. Again. I don’t know what came over me.” The murmur is quiet, as his throat muscles are clenching up now for an entirely different set of reasons.

_ I’m...Riku is my best friend. Always has been.  _

_ I wanted to lean up and kiss his cheek just now. I don’t know why. It just felt like the right thing to do. Do friends do that?? _

_...I feel like the answer is no. And for some reason...I don’t know why, but it makes me sad. _

Riku’s head tilts to the side. “You can cry, if you’d like. You don’t need to be embarrassed. Not here, of all places.” There’s a dry note to Riku’s tone, and an obvious amount of resignation. 

_ Is he...I get the feeling he’s not planning to stand up and fight this time. The swarm is getting louder...I...I… _

“I’m caught in a time-loop.”

The words are out before he can take them back. If he could’ve clapped his hands over his mouth in shock, he would’ve. 

There is a long moment of silence.

Riku is staring at him, eyes wide and unblinking. “I’m...sorry, what?”

Sora presses back against the wave of panic and tries to clench his nerveless hands into fists. “I’m caught in a time-loop.” He takes a ragged breath to steady his nerves, and forges onwards. “This is like...the sixth time we’ve done this. I haven’t really been counting...exactly.”

It takes an obvious moment of hesitation for Riku to compute this, but when he does, he seems to digest it with admirable aplomb. “You mean...what kind of time-loop? Where does it restart?”

The shrieking whistle of the swarm is getting louder again, and Sora hurries the words out in a dull sort of panic. “The Heartless swallow us all up, and then I’m back where we’re all approaching that guy.” Something in his chest spasms, and his breath hitches in response. “I don’t know what to do. Riku-” and that’s definitely a sob he’s fighting back, “I’ve tried everything.”

Riku’s eyes are glued to his face, and it’s beyond Sora’s capacity at the moment to name what emotion is on his friend's face. “Okay...have you…” His brow furrows. “Have you told me before?”

Managing a small shake to his head, which is all the auxiliary movement he seems capable of, Sora stubbornly fights against another sob. “No. Haven’t...had the time.” 

_ Riku...I already feel lighter telling you. Even just for this moment, I’m not alone.  _

_....It’s probably too much to hope that this will change anything. The darkness will take us both...and you won’t remember.  _

The hiss of the Heartless amalgamation grows closer. 

_ Huh...it’s that weird feeling again. _

Riku looks lost in thought. “Hmm...so if the shadows catch us every time...have you tried-”

There’s no time. The darkness is swirling down upon them with a hungering shriek. 

It has been proven that sometimes, in life or death situations, that the human body may sometimes accomplish great feats of physical strength, that it might not otherwise be at all capable of without the extenuating circumstances of peril. A primal desire to survive...or in some cases to protect. 

This is one such moment. With a strength that was not there moments prior, and a will strong enough to make unresponsive muscles cleave to it’s desires, Sora leans up, and presses his mouth against Riku’s cheek. 

“Thank you,” he whispers, eyes lidded shut to avoid the grossed out confusion that’s probably on his friend’s face, “and I’m sorry.”

_ There’s something in my chest that’s satisfied by doing that...but I don’t know what its name is. No, that’s wrong...I know what it is. But it’s different now. It’s been there my whole life...but I don’t recognise it anymore.  _

_ I’m...scared of it. _

Before Riku could even hope to respond, the tenuous sacred moment is devoured by inky shadows. All is again lost to the void, divided and made moot. 

[Continue]

The sun is suddenly very bright in his vision, and Sora takes those precious few seconds to remember how his limbs work. Ven is running towards the man with Terra’s face, because of course he is. Aqua is already striding after him, the moments blurring together with deja vu. 

Tears are still streaming down his face, and mindlessly he reaches up to wipe them away. He can’t falter now. He should call for Master Aqua, and alert her suspicion even more. Maybe, if they’re just a little bit faster this time, they can-

Arms are suddenly wrapping around him, and Sora finds his face smothered in a very familiar shoulder, swept up onto his tip-toes and into the embrace. 

“Sora,” Riku breathes out, his arms tight around Sora’s shoulders,  _ “Sora.” _

_ I… _

It’s too much to believe. Tears of resignation have become something entirely different, even as Sora finds himself choking back sobs of disbelief.

“Riku…?”

_ Does he...did telling him...it can’t be. It can’t be that easy. It  _ can’t  _ be. _

Ven cries out in pain. 

Even though it’s oddly painful to fight back against his gut instinct to just sink into Riku’s embrace for a few precious moments longer, Sora extricates himself from that circle of arms, and stares up at him with the thousand words he doesn’t have the time to say right now. 

“I…” He bites down on his bottom lip, almost enough to break the skin. “We’ll talk in a minute.” And before Riku can stop him, he turns, summoning the Kingdom Key to his hand in the next instant and dashing towards where the scuffle has begun again.

With a start, he realizes Riku’s only a few paces behind him, summoning his own keyblade, and it’s with the rush of that realization that he leaps towards Not-Terra, summoning the most powerful spell he can think of in a split-second.

...Not-Terra seems more miffed by the sudden Blizzaga to the face then anything else, but it does buy them a few precious moments where he’s busy shaking frost off his face and not snapping anyone’s spine. By this point, the other guardians have shaken off their surprise and fallen into battle stance, eyes glued to the lone opponent. 

Riku’s at his shoulder, and even as their enemy summons his silver keyblade with a smirk, Riku gently bumps him with his elbow, voice suitably lowered. “Hey. We’ll get through this.”

Suddenly Sora’s vision blurs rapidly with the sudden onset of tears, and he blinks furiously to clear it. “...right.” If Riku notices how small or broken the phrase comes out, he kindly doesn’t remark on it. 

Sans warning, with three measured paces Aqua strides out beyond the line they had instinctively fallen into, and levels her keyblade at the man. “I faced and defeated you before.” Her tone is level, but something in her voice makes Sora want to turn and flee the area just to avoid the fallout that will most likely happen next. “Your darkness will not cage Terra forever. Now...” And her stance slips into a position ready to attack. “Give him back before I cast your miserable consciousness into a shadow so deep it will never return.”

Even Mickey seems taken aback by the sheer venom in her voice. Sora considers the fact it probably has something to do with poor Ven’s unconscious form laying some ten yards behind them in a crumpled heap, and decides that if Master Aqua is in an especially murderous mood, it’s understandable. 

The man who isn’t Terra doesn’t seem ruffled much by her chilling declarative, but then again, that smirk seems almost permanently painted onto his face at this point. “Poor girl. You want your foolish friend back so much?” He raises the odd looking keyblade. “You cannot reclaim what has already been completely consumed by the darkness.”

With a jerky wave of her hand, a glittering barrier rises into place, locking the other guardians out of the conflict, to their audible dismay. Sora feels his heart leap into his throat, as memories of the last time this happened come flooding back.

Seemingly unperturbed by the dismay she has caused behind her, Aqua darts towards the man with all the force of an arrow on the wind, with an accompanying shout that echoes around the canyon. 

The battle begins in a blaze of light and shadow, as the reflective barrier magnifies the clash within. It quickly becomes difficult to see the two figures inside, as magical residue and blazing light fight for dominance in everyone’s retinas. 

Without his direct input, Sora finds his teeth are gritted and his hands have clenched into fists, as the tenseness of unknowing pervades the helpless onlookers. Beside him, Riku is leaning forward slightly, as if that will help him see any better, and without looking Sora can tell the rest of them are collectively on the very edge of their metaphorical seats. 

“Master Aqua is super strong,” he finds himself muttering, more to himself than anyone else. “She can do this.”

Not turning his head, Riku quietly responds from beside him. “She is. I just…” His friend’s eyes narrow as another burst of light clashing against voluminous darkness rings out. “Has she done this before?”

Sora can only shake his head, gnawing on his lower lip. “...not like this.” They’ve lowered themselves to whispers, and it would beggar disbelief if anyone could hear them over the sounds of the duel.

_ He’s here. He remembers. I’m not alone in this. I’m not alone in this. I… _

_ We should tell the others!! If it made Riku remember, than surely it’ll make the others remember too! _

With that thought, which has spread the skeleton of a smile over his expression, he turns to the king, but before he can even open his mouth-

The barrier implodes, shattering into a rain of crystal fragments which fade the instant they hit the earth. A billowing cloud of darkness surges forth, filling the canyon until Sora can barely see his hands in front of his face. 

“Riku!” He yells out on instinct, “Your Majesty!!” 

Responses of various volume echo out, so it would seem they’re all still present and accounted for...for now at least. 

He forges towards where the voices seemed to come from, squinting in the inky fog. “Guys!!”

There is, quite suddenly and with no warning, a taller presence behind him. Sora whirls around in a finely tuned daze, reaching to strike the figure until he realizes it’s just Lea, looking somewhat worse for wear. 

The new keyblade wielder is staring down at him with wide eyes, lips slightly parted as if in shock. His arms are hanging limpy at his sides, with no sign of moving. 

Sora tilts his head to the side, taking a step forward. “Lea…?”

With a jagged continuous movement, Lea’s head lolls forward as if a puppet whose strings have been suddenly severed, and with no prior warning other than a somewhat wet sound, the odd silver keyblade suddenly appears, issuing from the front of the older wielder’s stomach. 

A dry gasp of horror escapes him, even as he wills himself to take another step back and hold his keyblade with a tighter grasp. The smoke is just barely beginning to clear, but even now he can see the man wrenching his keyblade out of Lea’s folded body and turning towards him with that ever present smile. 

His knees are trembling, he registers with some distance, unable to control how his stance keeps slipping against the loose gravel and sand. 

The man with Terra’s face is striding towards him, and raising the silver keyblade now coated red. Dimly, the thoughts chasing each other around in the back of Sora’s mind wonder if Riku’s memory will hold out to the next reset, or if he’ll be explaining it all again while Ven gets punted across the desert like a golf ball. 

_ “Zettaflare!!” _

In the empty moments after Donald’s cry rings out, and Not-Terra has stopped yelling by virtue of being blasted out of the ring and all the way to next Tuesday, Sora finds himself on his knees, trying to calm his stuttering breath. 

Lea’s body is still sprawled on the ground at an unnatural angle before him, and he’s vacantly left unsurprised by the tears now flowing down his own face with extra temerity. Maybe they’re Roxas’s tears. Maybe they’re all his. Maybe both. 

_ Not again...even this time I- _

Before his thoughts can continue in that vein any longer, Riku’s hands are at his back, and propping him up into a warm and somewhat too tight embrace. 

“Sora,” he hears the faint whisper into the top of his head, “what happens next?”

Dimly, Sora stares down at where his own hands are hanging loose and limp. “Next,” he murmurs back, “next the Heartless will come and swallow us all up again.”

As if those words were the cue they were waiting for, the Shadow swarms whistles menacingly through the sky, glomming on and absorbing any stray Heartless into it’s bulk. With dispassion, the tail end snatches both Ven and Aqua up, as if simply to spite them. 

The sight of it turns to a blurry ink blot in Sora’s vision, spilling over and flooding his entire line of sight. His shoulders shudder uncontrollably.

_ I...Ven and Lea...I just…I’m tired. I’m tired of watching everyone die around me. _

_ I can’t do this. We might as well lay down here and just- _

“Sora.” Riku’s voice is a gentle reprimand. “You don’t believe that.”

Oh. So he said all that  _ out loud. _

He leans away, so he can look up at where Riku is kneeling next to him. “Riku...I…” His vision blurs again, and helpless, his hands find their grip in the lapels of Riku’s jacket.

Elsewhere, there’s the sounds of Kairi and Goofy yelling out as the tide steals them away again. Mickey’s voice echoes out directly after, much closer, but torn away all too quickly. 

They are alone, waiting for the darkness.

The sobs are harder to keep pushing down, and Sora doesn’t even want to consider the red and blubbering mess he must be by now, and how Riku can even stand to look at him like this. Words swell up in his throat, but none make it into the realm of coherency as he chokes on his own despair, curling inwards to hide his face.

Riku’s head tips to the side, and, much too gently, his fingers come up to brush away the tears. “Hey. Look at me?” 

It’s unbearable, the kindness and affection that sits comfortably in his friend’s tone, and for the first time he can recall in that moment, Sora finds himself at a loss for how to respond to it. So instead of responding, he simply tilts his head up, hoping he’s not as red in the face as he feels. 

In a moment that makes his heart stutter and miss a few beats, Riku leans forward and presses his lips to Sora’s cheek in a perfect mirror of what he himself had done not that long again. “Sora.” Riku’s voice is barely above a whisper. “You’ve got this.”

Hope, mingled with terror, mingled with a quiet and sacred ecstasy, overflows in Sora’s chest. But before he can open his mouth to reply, before he can even think of asking the multitude of questions on the tip of his tongue, before he can even process anything that just happened, Riku is dropping his hands, standing, and turning towards the swirling darkness.

_ No…!! _

Sora’s ears are faintly ringing. Riku’s footsteps get farther and farther away, until they are consumed by the noise of the rising wind. The surrounding world loses more and more of it’s color with every passing moment.

With a gasp, he staggers to his feet, shaky knees be damned, and shambles after Riku in a desperate bid. He shouts out his friend’s name, the dearly beloved soul who is striding confidently towards the abyss for  _ his _ sake and-

Riku does not scream. He raises Braveheart, and plunges it forwards into descending darkness, and as he does so, a great white light issues forth with all the blazing temerity of a newborn sun.

It blinds him so that his pace stutters, stumbling to his knees, and watching with terror as the shadows begin to consume Riku’s body, bleeding into him and through his frail human body. 

_ “Riku!!!” _

All is plunged into the abyss.

…

……

_ It’s cool...almost cold, but not quite.  _

_ I can barely feel the rest of me...why do I feel so floaty? _

Sora blinks into awareness. A blue sky graced with white clouds shines above him. Dawn, in all it’s metaphorical glory. 

The urge to cry wells up within him like a waterfall, but for some reason the tears do not come. He reaches within desperately for the stuttering beat in his chest that would inform him that he’s alive-

And finds nothing.

He stands, with all the force of moving mountains, and realizes he’s no more material than the glassy water that stretches out as far as the eye can see in every direction. Sora can only stare at his own body in disbelief, unable to process anything with any sort of alacrity. 

_ We...I’m...it’s over?? It’s really over this time??? _

One foot sets out in front of the other, almost without his express permission, as if some magnet is drawing him forwards. Something...there is some sort of presence...something awaiting.

“Can’t stay away now, can you?”

A sparkly chattering noise like a squeal grabs his attention, drawing it upwards to the glittering presence that suddenly coalesces into a small tubby creature with stripes like a cat.

It only gets weirder from there. 

It is with mingled disappointment and relief that Sora learns he is alone. No one has arrived with him evidently, though he can’t imagine why that might be. He must continue on in solitude, if continue on he will. 

There is no choice for him, as to whether to continue forward on faint and insubstantial hope. An answer set in stone. Something immutable...something etched. 

The Heartless decorated as a Reaper stands in his path over and over again. It is with a vicious fury that Sora doggedly chases after it, and watches as the shackles over his friend’s hearts are unbound and released. 

The chase continues. The youngest of the Xehanort’s approaches with a measured smirk and cryptic words...but none of it matters. The only thing that continues to hold meaning is seeing his friends restored.

With bated breath, and some measure of horror and distaste, Sora finds himself in that accursed graveyard again, Donald and Goofy at his side. If they notice his slightly accelerated breathing or glassy eyes, they kindly don’t comment on it, most likely chalking it up to nerves before the beginning of the final encounter.

There,  _ there,  _ the figures of his friend stand up ahead, silhouetted against the dry and unforgiving light that pours into the canyon. 

And then,  _ then,  _ he sees Riku turn, silver hair painted gold in the light of the sun, and begin dashing back towards him. 

Destiny awaits.

**Author's Note:**

> I was very tempted to make this a multi chapter fic, just to give the reader the experience of physically having to click 'next chapter' after each [Continue], but ultimately decided against it. The concept of that is good, but I don't think my execution or pacing of this fic was quite enough to warrant it being multi-chaptered lol. Anyway, I hope someone enjoyed reading this! It's been sitting in my WIP collection for so long; it was a relief to finally finish it and polish it up. 
> 
> Unrelated, but I love how this fic just takes and runs with the idea that Terranort would just. Have straight up just murdered all the guardians right then and there. Not even bothering to do any weird heart shenanigans (or at least, only after they were all down for the count), just literally straight up murdered them. Fun times.


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